Tuesday's Inspirations - Bird By Bird - Story's finished.

When I read this essay by Anne Lamott I learned I'm a writer she wouldn't like. She talks about how after sending out a manuscript whether to a reader, an agent or an editor she spends days watching the mail, waiting for the phone call and being unable to write. She remarks that there are other writers who send out the story and immediately sit down to start something new.

What about you? Are you a hoverer or a moving along sort of person? My take on this and this is just my kind of writing is that once I've sent a story or a novel out into the world, I must distract myself from thinging about what ifs. What if whoever is reading the pages hates the story? What if they love it and consider it the best thing I've ever written? Those kind of thoughts would impede me. The story that has gone into the world is the best I could do at the time with the material conjured in my imagination. It's complete until I receive suggestions, critiques or whatever befalls the story.

Of course in the back of my mind these questions lurk ready to pounce out if I let them. Just remember this my husband was undergoing major surgery and was given a fifty/fifty chance of surviving. I sat in the hospital waiting room with clipboard, notebook and pen and wrote on the mss I had been working on at home. Why? If I could escape I couldn't think about what might happen. That's the way I feel when I've completed a story to my satisfaction and have sent it on its way.

What about you? Do you sit by the phone and every time it rings nearly have heart failure? Do you watch the mail or look at your email waiting for some response, any response? Or do you sit down and take that new idea and see where it leads, hopefully away from thinking about the what ifs?